PowerMac 6100 doesn't boot 7.6

Question

PowerMac 6100 doesn't boot 7.6

Hello,

My Power Mac 6100/60 AV refuses to run 7.6.1. I installed a brand new system from a CD and everything went fine during the installation, but as soon as I restarted I got this white window and the system frozen with no mouse pointer:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5417175/6100-freeze.jpg

Shift-booting works, so I thought it's an extension problem. I disabled everything in the Extensions Manager - still not working. System 7.1.2, 7.5.5 and 8.1 worked fine on that computer. Why 7.6 and 7.6.1 don't work?

Mac mini 2009, PowerMac G5, iBook G4, iMac G5, Mac OS X (10.6.7)

Posted on Mar 28, 2011 10:03 AM

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Answer 1

Allan Jones

Level 9

68,708 points

Mar 28, 2011 11:09 AM in response to Tudor Vedeanu

It may need a different system enabler. If the 7.6 disk was one that shipped with another model Mac (as opposed to a retail install set) it may not have the proper enabler.

Mine successfully ran 7.6 installed from a retail set of floppies. Unfortunately, I scavenged its HD for another Mac so I can't check on its enabler version.

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Answer 2

Mar 28, 2011 11:27 AM in response to Allan Jones

I used a retail 7.6.1 CD.
I'm going to try the floppy version, maybe I'll have more luck.

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Answer 3

Allan Jones

Level 9

68,708 points

Mar 28, 2011 2:16 PM in response to Tudor Vedeanu

The retail CD should have the proper enabler. I'd be inclined to reinstall from the CD before taking on the job via floppy. Floppies take forever!

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Answer 4

Mar 29, 2011 9:14 AM in response to Allan Jones

On another forum someone told me he had the very same problem with his 6100. He eventually found a 7.6.1 version which worked fine, but he has no idea how the problem fixed itself.

I checked the connections inside the computer, took off the RAM (2 x 32 MB), the CD-ROM unit and the Ethernet transceiver, it still doesn't work.

I have 8.1 running fine on another partition. And 7.5.5 was installed before and also worked wine. I erased the hard drive and installed 7.6.1 three times and every time I had the same problem. This is driving me crazy.

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Answer 5

Jeff

Level 6

12,058 points

Mar 29, 2011 10:50 PM in response to Tudor Vedeanu

When running OS 7.6.1, the absence of a visible enabler file shouldn't cause concern. A universal enabler is built into the System file. As for the retail installer disk that you're using, does it have this number on it: 691-1613-A?

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Answer 6

Zer0reZ

Level 1

84 points

Mar 30, 2011 3:11 PM in response to Tudor Vedeanu

Interesting, I thought it was only me with this issue! (6100/60, 40 MB memory, no cards) I found it to also affect 7.5.5 though - however I can run 7.1.2, 8.1, 9.1 and even Copland D11E4 fine (well, in the case of Copland as well as it ever runs 😉 )

I went through and took out all the extensions that looked as though they might be for different machines, and even tried moving the whole contents of the Extensions and Control Panels folders out but it still only worked with Shift held down, weird...

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Answer 7

Mar 30, 2011 11:21 PM in response to Tudor Vedeanu

Problem solved!

Here's what I did. I booted from an Apple Software Restore CD (the one that has all Mac OS versions prior to 9) and initialized the hard drive (again) using Drive Setup 1.7.3. This time I only made a single partition. Then I updated the disk driver. This is something I don't remember doing before, at least not using Drive Setup 1.7.3. And finally I installed 7.6 and 7.6.1 from that Apple Software Restore CD.

I tried installing from that CD before and it failed, so I can only assume updating the disk driver using Drive Setup 1.7.3 did the trick. The idea came to me after reading this tech note:

http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1249?viewlocale=en_US

Mac OS 7.6 discs have an earlier version of Drive Setup (1.2.2) so it's possible 1.7.3 did something different to the disk.

Message was edited by: Tudor Vedeanu

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